Return of a Native

As a 19-year-old novice on Fleet Street, William J. Haley got his first job on London's Times answering the telephone. Last week at 51, Sir William Haley, now director general of the British Broadcasting Corp., got ready to go to work for the Times again, this time as editor. Named to the top editorial spot in British journalism and the first titled editor ever to run the venerable Times (circ. 231,659), Sir William takes the place of William F. Casey, 68, who, after four years in the editor's chair and four decades on the paper, is resigning because of poor health.

Fleet Streeters regard Sir William as one of Britain's best journalists. An omnivorous reader (as many as 250 books a year), he has a diamond-sharp mind crammed with facts and ideas, which he uses with ice-cold efficiency. At BBC, he was a respected and stern director whose every murmur was a command, and who was good-naturedly known by staffers as "the man with two glass eyes."

Born in the Channel Islands, Haley quit school at 16 to go to sea as a telegrapher on a tramp steamer. Later, he cubbed on a provincial paper, did his brief stint on the Times and went up to Manchester to become a reporter on the Evening News. In a short time he was named news editor. He disdained a desk, worked standing up at a breast-high table so he would lose no time dashing off to composing room or editor's office. His nose for news was so sharp that, at 29, he was named editor, and seven years later co-managing director of both the News and its more famous sister, the Manchester Guardian. At a time when many of Britain's papers were backing the government's appeasement policy toward the Nazis, Haley, a staunch Liberal, wrote forthright editorials attacking the government.

When BBC created the job of editor in chief in 1943, Haley took it. In nine months he was promoted to director general, was responsible for the "Light Program," Britain's most popular, and the famed highbrow "Third Program." Even though BBC's board is appointed by the government, Haley was no subservient government servant. Fleet Streeters expect that at the Times Sir William will also run his own show. For many years the Times often behaved as if it were the unofficial voice of the government, no matter what the government's political stripe. But since World War II, the Times has followed its own direction, and Sir William is expected to make it even more independent. Commented the Manchester Guardian: "The Times [will have] a great editor."

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